We've asked our London Walkers and
London Walks guides to nominate their favorite London songs… and the playlist
is proving to be wide-ranging and eclectic indeed. From punk to jazz, with a little music hall thrown in along the way, we'll be collating them all here on The Daily Constitutional to mark the launch of our new Rock'n'Roll London Pub Walk every Wednesday from 1st May 2013.
As usual, we want to hear from you. What are your favorite London songs? Anything goes, from a tune mentioning a London location, to a piece of music composed here, if it has a strong London connection or theme, we'll add it to the list. Email us at the usual address, message us on Twitter @londonwalks or leave a comment below…
Here's LW's Richard IV with his favorite London music…
Thinking about those London songs, I’d have to pick something by Eric Coates, from either his ‘London’ Suite or his ‘London Again’ Suite. Much as I love the ‘Knightsbridge’ march, it always makes me chuckle as I think of it accompanying Michael Palin’s incident-packed journey to work in an early Monty Python, so I’ll plump for the moving ‘Langham Place’ Elegie. I first heard it many years ago at the National Film Theatre, when it was played prior to various screenings of early Hitchcock films, and the front-of-house staff kindly told me what it was. Which reminds me, the Alfred Hitchcock’s London walk gets another outing on Sunday May 12th at 10:45 from Holborn. Hitchcock’s ‘Frenzy’ figures prominently among the locations, and the opening music for that film, by Ron Goodwin, is another great London piece, accompanying the long helicopter shot towards Tower Bridge. A stirring, magisterial, affectionate introduction to the city, it gives no hint of the horrors of the ‘necktie murders’ which are to come!
As for actual songs, I have a fondness for ‘Portobello Road’ from ‘Bedknobs and Broomsticks’ (‘Artefacts to glorify a regal abode / Are hidden in the flotsam in Portobello Road!’) but my vote has to go to ‘You Never Know Just Who You’re Going To Meet (When You’re Walking Down A Busy London Street)’: I don’t know its exact title, but it features in Basil Rathbone’s last film outing as Sherlock Holmes, made in Hollywood back in 1946 (and bafflingly known as both 'Dressed to Kill' and 'Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Code'). I suspect it was invented for the film, and it is probably best sung with a cod Cockney accent, but with lines like ‘You’d better hold your topper in your hand / Just in case you meet a lady on the Strand’ it deserves to be better known. Coincidentally, a certain regular Friday afternoon walk starts at Embankment at 2pm and goes along the Strand…
Thanks Richard!
(That “certain walk” to which Richard refers is, of course, his excellent Sherlock Holmes which goes every Friday. More details at the main website here: In The Footsteps of Sherlock Holmes.)
And here’s the Langham Place Elegie…
A London Walk costs £9 – £7 concession. To join a London Walk, simply meet your guide at the designated tube station at the appointed time. Details of all London Walks can be found at www.walks.com.
